Feeding everyone no matter what : managing food security after global catastrophe / David Denkenberger, Joshua M. Pearce.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Denkenberger, David, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Food security.

Sustainability.

Survival.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (134 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

London, England : Academic Press, 2015.

Summary:

Feeding Everyone No Matter What presents a scientific approach to the practicalities of planning for long-term interruption to food production.The primary historic solution developed over the last several decades is increased food storage. However, storing up enough food to feed everyone would take a significant amount of time and would increase the price of food, killing additional people due to inadequate global access to affordable food. Humanity is far from doomed, however, in these situations - there are solutions.This book provides an order of magnitude technical analysis comparing caloric requirements of all humans for five years with conversion of existing vegetation and fossil fuels to edible food. It presents mechanisms for global-scale conversion including: natural gas-digesting bacteria, extracting food from leaves, and conversion of fiber by enzymes, mushroom or bacteria growth, or a two-step process involving partial decomposition of fiber by fungi and/or bacteria and feeding them to animals such as beetles, ruminants (cows, deer, etc), rats and chickens. It includes an analysis to determine the ramp rates for each option and the results show that careful planning and global cooperation could ensure the bulk of humanity and biodiversity could be maintained in even in the most extreme circumstances.- Summarizes the severity and probabilities of global catastrophe scenarios, which could lead to a complete loss of agricultural production- More than 10 detailed mechanisms for global-scale solutions to the food crisis and their evaluation to test their viability- Detailed roadmap for future R&D for human survival after global catastrophe

Contents:

Cover

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

Contents

Acknowledgments

About the authors

Chapter 1 - Introduction

1.1 - Introduction to the challenge

References

Chapter 2 - Worldwide Crop Death: The Five Crop-Killing Scenarios

2.1 - The five crop-killing scenarios

2.2 - Abrupt climate change

2.3 - Lesser evils - global crop irritating scenarios

2.3.1 - Super Weeds and Pathogens

2.3.2 - Super Pests

2.3.3 - Super Bacterium

2.4 - Serious problems that do not threaten global food supply

2.5 - Food spoilage

Chapter 3 - No Sun: Three Sunlight-Killing Scenarios

3.1 - Three sunlight-killing scenarios

Chapter 4 - Food Storage, Food Conservation, and Cannibalism

4.1 - Reduction of pre-harvest losses

4.2 - Increased food supply for moderate disasters

4.3 - Limited crop supply

4.4 - Maximum food storage

4.5 - Food solutions from preppers and survivalists

4.6 - Beyond Mormon Preparedness: Practical Limitations to Storing 5 Years of Food

4.7 - Survivalism and Cannibal Mathematics

Chapter 5 - Stopgap Food Production: Fast food

5.1 - The 10 °C Crisis and the 20 °C Crisis

5.2 - Stopgap food production: fast food

5.2.1 - Exacting Food from Leaves

5.2.2 - Supply: Global Nonwoody Vegetation

5.3 - Mushroom fast food

5.4 - Not quite as good as mushrooms - bacteria to humans fast food

Chapter 6 - Fiber Supply for Conversion to Food

6.1 - Fiber supply for conversion to food

6.2 - Worst case: 20 °C crisis fiber availability

6.3 - Wood chipping

6.4 - Fire suppression

Chapter 7 - Solutions: Stored Biomass/Fossil Fuel Conversion to Food

7.1 - Solutions introduction

7.2 - Sushi for dinner?

7.3 - Oil and gas for dinner? the case for industrial food.

7.4 - Trees for dinner? stored biomass conversion

7.4.1 - Beef Steak, Lamb Chops, and Bison Burgers

7.4.2 - More Mushrooms

7.4.3 - Beetles

7.4.4 - Rats or Chicken?

7.5 - What will probably not work: shipworms, termites, gribbles, earthworms, and reptiles

7.6 - A banquet

7.7 - Most extreme catastrophes

Chapter 8 - Practical Matters: Energy, Water, Nutrition, Taste, Biodiversity, &amp

Cooperation

8.1 - Practical matters

8.2 - Energy in the sun-obscuring crises

8.3 - Water

8.4 - Nutrition and taste

8.5 - Biodiversity

8.6 - Other problems

8.7 - Cooperation: the elephant in the room

Chapter 9 - Moral Hazard

9.1 - Moral hazard of writing this book

9.2 - Nuclear stockpiles increasing if reduced risk of nuclear winter causing mass starvation?

9.3 - Greenhouse gas emissions increasing if starvation risk of abrupt climate change diminished?

9.4 - Moral hazard of other risks

9.5 - Conclusion: why you are able to read this book now

Chapter 10 - Serious Prepping: A Guide to Necessary Research

10.1 - Policy implications

10.2 - Applying solutions to catastrophes now to provide food for today's hungry

10.3 - Future work

10.4 - Preparation

10.5 - How can i prepare myself and my family?

10.6 - What can i do?

References.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references at the end of each chapters.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (ebrary, viewed December 8, 2014).

ISBN:

0-12-802358-9

OCLC:

896800254